There’s no such thing as gay rights. Or, at least if you listen to Republican Senator Rand Paul, there isn’t. But don’t believe me. He said so himself in a video resurrected from 2013.
Given the age of the interview, all this might seem like old news if it weren’t for the fact that Paul is likely to be running for President of the United States next year.
Lest you think I’ve got something confused, Paul said, “I don’t think I’ve ever used the words gay rights because I don’t believe in rights based on your behavior. I’m pro-rights for individuals but I’m not for judging individuals based on their behavior.”
Now this is a man who has often said that he is “offended” by same-sex marriage. The kind that I had just last week when I married my husband in Maui on Poolenalena Beach with the Reverend Kevin Rebelo officiating. Beautiful ceremony, just as the sun set into the Pacific. You should have been there.
Trust me when I say that the sun was big and orange and put on a performance that was certainly ordered direct from heaven. Afterward the sky turned into a blaze of pinks and purples that confirmed there is a God somewhere. Just not in the vicinity of Rand Paul.
To Paul, my marriage is the result of a moral crisis in this country. “I’m for traditional marriage. I think marriage is between a man and a woman,” he has said.
“Ultimately, we could have fixed this a long time ago if we just allowed contracts between adults. We didn’t have to call it marriage, which offends myself and a lot of people.”
As ungrammatical as the statement is, it pales in comparison to how Paul sees the larger picture in this country—contracts or no contracts.
“Don’t always look to Washington to solve anything,” said Paul as he lead a prayer breakfast in the Capitol Hill Club last week in Washington. “In fact, the moral crisis we have in our country, there is a role for us trying to figure out things like marriage, there’s also a moral crisis that allows people to think that there would be some sort of other marriage. And so, really there’s a role outside and inside government but the exhortation to sort of change people’s thoughts has to come through the countryside, from outside of Washington.” Quite a mouthful.
What confuses me, fresh from the memory of that Hawaiian sunset and all, is how Paul can repeatedly say (with a completely straight face), “You’ll find nobody in Congress doing more for minority rights than me right now – Republican or Democrat.”
So…if I can recap, Paul doesn’t believe in same-sex marriage, he thinks the country is in a moral crisis, and he thinks gay rights are hooey because he doesn’t believe in rights based on behavior. Yet, he’s doing more for minority rights than any other Republican or Democrat on the face of the earth.
I have to wonder out loud where these minorities are and just rights do they have that he’s protecting. The right to keep and bear arms. Paul likes that one. Oh wait, that is based on behavior, since in order to have that right, one needs to keep and bear, well, weapons. Hmm.
Okay, well maybe, Paul was speaking about the right to free speech. Ahhh…no, that one is based on behavior as well. Speaking up and speaking out. All good to Paul I suppose as long as you’re not speaking about same-sex marriage. That is crossing the line.
There’s freedom of religion, which Paul certainly believes in. He’s a baptized Episcopalian for crying out loud. But then again, one has to practice a religion, through behavior presumably. Opps, cross that one off Paul’s list as well.
You may think I’m taking this no-gay-rights business awfully lightly, but don’t be confused. I know there are gay rights, just as I know there is such a thing as same-sex marriage. I was there on the beach in Maui, after all.
No, it’s Rand Paul, the Tea Party Republican, I’m taking lightly—if at all. That’s the way I behave.
